she will git ter studyin' on that of a winter night, an' how
the woman that keered fer him mus' hev watched an' waited fer him, an'
'lowed he war deceitful an' desertin', an' mebbe held a gredge agin him,
whilst he war dyin' so pitiful an' helpless, walled up in that tree.
Then Meddy will tune up agin, an' mighty nigh cry her eyes out. He
warn't even graced with a death-bed ter breathe his last; Meddy air
partic'lar afflicted that he hed ter die afoot." Old Kettison glanced
about the circle, consciously facetious, his heavily grooved face
distended in a mocking grin.

"A horrible fate!" exclaimed Seymour, with a half-shudder.

"Edzac'ly," the old mountaineer assented easily.

"What's her name--Meggy?" asked the journalist, with a mechanical
aptitude for detail, no definite curiosity.

"Naw; Meddy--short fer Meddlesome. Her right name is Clementina Haddox;
but I reckon every livin' soul hev forgot' it but me. She is jes
Meddlesome by name, an' meddlesome by natur'."

He suddenly turned, gazing up the steep, wooded slope with an expectant
mien, for the gentle rustling amidst the dense, red leaves of the
sumac-bushes heralded an approach.

"That mus' be Meddy now," he commented, "with her salt-risin' bread. She
'lowed she war goin' ter fetch you-uns some whenst I tol' her you-uns
war lackin'."

For the camp-hunt had already been signalized by divers disasters: the
store of loaves in the wagon had been soaked by an inopportune shower;
the young mountaineer who had combined the offices of guide and cook was
the victim of an accidental discharge of a fowling-piece, receiving a
load of bird-shot full in his face. Though his injury was slight, he had
returned home, promising to supply his place by sending his brother, who
had not yet arrived. Purcell's boast that he could bake ash-cake proved
a bluff, and although the party could and did broil bacon and even birds
on the coals, they were reduced to the extremity of need for the staff
of life.

Hence they were predisposed in the ministrant's favor as she appeared,
and were surprised to find that Meddlesome, instead of masterful and
middle-aged, was a girl of eighteen, looking very shy and appealing as
she paused on the verge of the flaring sumac copse, one hand lifted to a
swaying bough, the other arm sustaining a basket. Even her coarse gown
lent itself to pleasing effect, since its dull-brown hue composed well
with the red and russet glow of the leaves about her, and